Fantastique wrote:
Jubber,
I'm pretty sure Mayo and I weren't addressing you specifically when we mentioned the hypocrisy we see within the republican party regarding abortion and gov't. It's good that you see it a bit differently.
However, our motives are not just to make ourselves feel good about ourselves, hell I don't think about people who are less fortunate than I am until I see them. But is it really okay to punish people that severely for being irresponsible? Just think about it - when a mistake is about to be made, do you honestly believe that people say to themselves "you know, this is a bad idea, but it's okay because if I get preggers the taxpayers will be able to handle all my problems"? I sincerely doubt it, and while the best thing to do about mistakes is not to make them, that's a very unrealistic view.
We've all made mistakes, and having someone tell you "too bad, so sad" doesn't help anyone and only makes it worse. Say a child is going to be born to a 19 year old in college. Parents find out, cut her off and kick her out. Guy leaves, doesn't want to fuck up his aspirations. She cannot get a legal abortion or any help from the now-nonexistent Planned Parenthood. She has to drop out of school. She has to get a job that pays squat. She has to work while preggers. No maternity leave. She has a couple options:
- Illegal abortion.
- Keep child, raise it in poverty.
I honestly see no upside to this, and wouldn't mind paying to help people in this situation out. Sure there may be a couple people who abuse the system, but the few shouldn't determine the fate of the many. I love the stories about those who do manage to make it, but those are few and far between. What would be your alternative?
Just wondering, not attacking. I expect a rebuttal, not a counter-attack.
That is an intelligent and valid response, and I agree. One dumb decision shouldn't screw up the rest of your life. However, we have instituted a system wherein we've negated so many of the negative consequences that even if people don't consciously think "I can do this and nothing bad will come of it," we have demonstrated exactly that lesson to them and encouraged behaviors we shouldn't. Worse yet, we've reinforced that mindset with a never-ending stream of demagoguery further reinforcing the impression that
nothing that is wrong with their life is their fault and they're just the victims of circumstance. In short, we're continuing on with the same failed solutions for these people that have not only failed to work but have made the problem worse for decades. We've created a permanent underclass. The problem isn't that there are people abusing the system so much as it is that the system is an abuse of the people it's supposed to be helping.
Like I said, legal abortion is a necessary evil, I just don't like the way it was worked into our legal framework. I was serious when I said that birth-control is a better alternative, but I know (from personal experience no less) that even when you take precautions, shit happens. It's a necessary fail-safe.
I've given a lot of thought to how to fix the problem of poverty, among others, and the solution is difficult because all our social problems eventually connect somehow. Poverty ties into joblessness, education, and the breakdown of the traditional family. You can't solve any one of those problems without solving the others, which I think is a big part of why our current system fails so hard. We have one or more programs aimed at a specific problem that in many cases exacerbates one of the contributing/conjoined problems and creates a self-feeding loop of decay. We do not as a society have a comprehensive plan to tackle our social ills.
Oddly enough, this is something that has been on my mind more-and-more since I was informed an old acquaintance of mine had succumbed to cancer. I used to have conversations about this on a local forum with a man named Joe Bageant. He was something of a leftist crackpot, but he meant well. He saw a lot of what I see, because he lived here, and this is really a poor-to-lower-middle-class area. Most of the people here work the kind of crap jobs you talk about where the conditions suck, no insurance/maternity leave. Joe and I could never agree about a solution, but we found a lot of commonality about what the actual problems were and what were causing them. That forum dried up years ago, and I lost touch with Joe. Then about a week ago, I came across a online eulogy for Joe on one of the blogs I check from time-to-time, and thought, "Wow, that name is familiar." It took me about twenty minutes to recall why. Joe never talked much about himself on that forum. His only interest was what was wrong and how to fix it, and even though we didn't agree much on solutions, I understood he wanted the best for people, and I (hope)think he thought the same of me.
Turns out Joe was actually someone relevant, not just to me and blogger that clued me in to his passing. I had spent almost a year fine-tuning my thinking by arguing with a
truly decent and (arguably) influential individual. I think I only met Joe in person once, if that, when the online community had a get-together at one of the local bars. I hadn't thought about Joe in years, and can't find any references to that old forum or any of our discussions, but for some reason I've been a little fixated on it, and I realize that even though most of our time together was on the internet, I miss Joe now, even though I hadn't thought of him in years. Since poverty and the causes of it were our main topic of discussion, I've probably reacted a little harshly, because it is a bit emotional for me right now.
It's really weird that I'd find out from some guy living in Mexico that some other guy I used to butt heads with on the internet had died, it was even stranger finding out things about Joe I hadn't known, like his being a published author and (at least semi-)serious columnist. The internet has made the world smaller, I'm not sure what we're doing with it is making it any better, though. "Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind," and for that matter, so does any man's suffering. That's another reason I can't abide some of the silliness I hear about how some of us are bad people who don't care, especially when it comes from people who don't see how their goodwill and means of employing it are perpetuating the hardship we all want to put to an end.
I'm sick, and I'm very, very tired even after having slept all night. I'm going to take some pills and go to bed. I'll talk to you guys later.
Your Pal,
Jubber
